Thursday, September 18, 2014

Every fall, the info technology team (the library media specialist and myself) organize 3 digital discussion times for all ninth graders. The students choose a topic and are put in to small groups. They watch a video, do a reading and then come up with some questions for discussion. They spend the bulk of the class period having the discussion about their topic. We host everything on a site.

This year we have seen a rise in negative behavior around social apps, like Yik Yak which allow for anonymous posting. The content tends to be explicit, and while the use of names is not allowed, students can be targeted by initials or other identifying information. Our "Be The Change Team" has addressed some of the behavior by posting positive messages on Yik Yak, but we are looking for more resources to promote discussion around these difficult topics.

We are using the book Make Just One Change: Teach Students to Ask Their Own Questions as a guide for some of our work. I am looking for more resources either around discussion groups on tough topics or good digital citizenship resources. Previous links that I have collected are here,. If you have something to share, please add to the comments. Stay tuned as we will be updating the site in the next 2 weeks.